The goal of this assignment is to get you thinking about the application of
the theories of persuasion we are talking about in class as they relate to
present and future environments.

Assignment

Pick one of the following locations:

Kendall inbound T station

The E25 medical building doors

The Cambridge Center rooftop garden area

Then pick one or two of the following behavior change domains:

Better eating (i.e. nutritional) decisions

Saving energy/resources

Getting more exercise

Now spend 30 minutes observing and taking field notes (as in previous
assignment) at your location. Map the space and focus your efforts on studying
how the information environment and physical environment are motivating
physical behaviors related to
your behavior topic selection. Think carefully about how information is being
conveyed (e.g. from person to person). Pay attention to the objects
people are using and what they are attending to.

Next (if possible in the same location) spend another 1.5 hours developing
several ideas for how to change the physical and/or digital environment to motivate behavior
change.

As in the flossing design
assignment, you can assume that you have any advanced
technology or materials available today at your disposal
and that cost of the technology/materials/renovations is not an issue. However, you cannot
assume that you (as the space/product creator) have an infinite supply of money to give to people to motivate
behavior changes.

Your ideas should help motivate the
behavior change(s) for months and years. Think about what will keep the
motivational components working well beyond the novelty phase (but in a way
that does not require a constant influx of funds!). For each significant component of
your ideas, list at least one concept from the readings so far lending support
for your strategy.

Use persuasion, not coercion

The idea here is not to simply motivate behavior change by
disallowing status quo behavior. For instance, forcing people to get stair
climbing exercise
by eliminating elevators would not be a good design. Not
only would it ignore the needs of the elderly or disabled, it may cause people
to avoid the final destination all together! Be creative in your
approaches. You can add and change messages being conveyed (digital or otherwise),
you can propose changing the design of the space itself, or both. Don't forget
about mobile technologies as well.

Give each of your ideas a name to remember them by.

Hand-in

For each different idea, create a "summary poster" on an 8.5x11
sheet of paper. This can have diagrams, text, observations, or whatever you
feel best conveys your ideas and what makes them novel, interesting, and
(potentially) effective. This will be a slide that you can talk to when you
describe your ideas to help someone understand them. Make enough copies of
your summary sheets to hand out to each person in the class and an
additional copy to hand in. The summary should include information
suggesting why your ideas will work based on the
ideas we've read about in class so far. You should be prepared to describe and support your best
idea in about 1 minute in class.